Beating Post-Holiday Feast Blahs

Gentle Reader, do you ever find yourself a bit depressed when considering what to eat or prepare to eat following some big celebration, such as a holiday feast or special birthday meal? I'm not sure if the depression stems from the prospect of going back to the "usual" meals and foods or if it stems more from the realization that some special time has come and gone and you're back to the hum-drum of life.

Anywho, I found myself yesterday trying to figure out what to have for supper for a Friday night after a week of out-of-the-ordinary mealtimes. (For example, we had burritos on Monday, not on Wednesday, which is a huge change for us here at Chez Boeckman-Walker. And we went out to eat in the middle of the week. In the middle of the week!) I wasn't keen on making some chicken dish, and I wasn't ready to do leftovers. I wanted to make something, but I wasn't ready to commit to a huge production. After all, we had a run to HPB (20% Off Sale!) and HEB planned for the late afternoon, and those trips would cut into my prep and cooking time.

I then opened the spice/drug cabinet, and my eyes fell upon the cannister of Potlatch Seasoning the husband and I bought...gads, three or four years ago at Williams-Sonoma. I'd never opened it and distinctly recall shoving it in a bowl along with some other spice cabinet items we never used that I then shoved in a cabinet under the microwave where I store things I rarely use. I only rediscovered that bowl and the fish rub, and yesterday I thought to myself, Hell, I have all those basa fillets in the freezer, and I'm sure they're good for more than just fish tacos. And voila! I had the protein portion of Friday night's meal chosen.

But what to accompany the fish? The Potlatch Seasoning is a bit spicy with its crushed red pepper and chili pepper, but that wasn't inspiring me terribly. I didn't want to do rice because, quite frankly, I was all riced out after eating it three out of the four weekdays that had passed thus far. My thoughts turned to veggies, but I have to be careful when it comes to veggies or else I'll wind up with something neither of the boys will eat.

So what's a faudie to do? She opens up a cookbook or four and looks for inspiration.

Broccoli on the Brain
As I hunkered down in front of my cookbook shelf in the kitchen, I eyeballed Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian. Ms. Jaffrey had been on my mind because my 'rents-in-law had kindly given me her memoir for Christmas (and plan to start on it once I finish Something from the Oven: Reinventing Dinner in 1950s America, which is a great book I'll post about at some point, I'm sure). So off the shelf came World Vegetarian.

Why I had a desire to make something with broccoli I'm not sure. Perhaps because HEB's running it on sale this week. Perhaps because I'm fairly sure the boys will eat a decently sized portion of it when I prepare it. Of course, I've only prepared it with giant pasta shells, chicken, some ricotta and some spices, so how could I know that they'd eat it prepared a different way? Moreover, I didn't even have any brocc on hand, and I'm not keen on making a recipe these days if I don't already have the ingredients.

In the pages of World Vegetarian, I found a recipe for broccoli with potatoes. "How pedestrian and...American!" you might be saying to yourself right about now, Gentle Reader, right? Well, you'd be wrong. Jaffrey's recipe calls for two small potatoes or one waxy potato, asafetida, brown or yellow mustard seeds, a hot green chile, fresh curry leaves and amchar masala. Not exactly typical American fare, wouldn't you agree? And aside from not having brocc and fresh curry leaves (I have dry ones), I had everything I needed for this recipe and was entirely intrigued to know what the final product tasted like. So onto the HEB list went broccoli.

Broccoli With Potatoes6 C broccoli florets
NaCl
1 waxy potato (8 oz.) or 2 smaller ones, boiled, drained and cooled
3 T peanut or canola oil
Generous pinch of ground asafetida
1/2 t whole brown or yellow mustard seeds
1 fresh hot green chile, its tip cut off
10 fresh curry leaves (use fresh basil leaves as a different but interesting substitute)
1 t amchar masala

1. Blanch the broccoli florets in salted water. Drain and refresh under cold water if not cooking immediately. Leave in colander.
   
2. Peel the potato and cut into chunky dice about the same size as the florets.
   
3. Just before eating, put the oil in a large, preferably nonstick frying pan or saute pan and set over medium-high heat. When hot, add the asafetida and, a second later, the mustard seeds.
   
4. As soon as the mustard seeds begin to pop [And get all over the frickin' place! -Ed.], put in the green chile and curry leaves. Stir once then put in the potatoes. Stir and fry for about 4 min. or until the potatoes are very lightly browned.
   
5. Sprinkle the pan's contents with a scant 1/2 teaspoon of salt, then toss to mix.
   
6. Add the broccoli and amchar masala, turn the heat to medium and stir 1-2 min. or until the broccoli has heated through.
   
7. Turn off the heat and serve.

Yield: 4 servings of indeterminate size

Nutritional Info
Ms. Jaffrey doesn't include nutritional info for her recipes. Ah well.

The Faudie's Futzings

• I used two smallish red potatoes that were about a month old. They were a little soft and sprouting, but I think they did just fine.
  
• I used olive oil instead of canola oil, and I didn't use anywhere close to 3 tablespoons. Maybe a tablespoon, but no more than that.
  
• Even though I had dried curry leaves and could have bought fresh basil at HEB beforehand, I didn't add this ingredient. Did that screw me over in the flavor department? I don't know. I've never worked with fresh curry leaves before, and I'm not a big fan of basil. Guess I'll have to make the recipe again with some sort of fresh leaf ingredient and find out!

I think I might have screwed up minorly by peeling and cubing the potatoes before boiling them, but they didn't exactly turn to mush either then or when I put them in the pan to stir fry. But that might be the reason why they didn't exactly brown when they were in my stir-fry pan. They just...got a little greasy. But they were tasty!

Speaking of tasty, the dish went over really well with the boys. And I didn't have to spend too much time cleaning popped-out mustard seeds out of all of Lumpy's crevices and crannies. Woohoo!